1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a laminated, armored, bulletproof and/or shatterproof glass partition, which may be utilized for the protection of buildings or armored vehicles such as private vehicles, military vehicles or vehicles for the transport of cash. This type of glass partition is capable of being installed on vehicles for road, rail, marine or air transport.
2. Description of the Background
Considerable efforts have been made with a view to improving the resistance of armored glass partitions, in particular with respect to increasingly heavy bullets and increasingly powerful and concentrated impacts on a weak surface.
Several approaches occurred to inventors for improving the ballistic performances of these glass partitions.
In particular, some solutions have been proposed to improve the fastening of aircraft windshields. These do not have to withstand impacts of bullets, but only birds which may collide with them, and accordingly have a structure differing in the nature of the components of the laminate and more delicate than that of the armored glass partition now under consideration.
Thus, the patent U.S. Pat. No. 3,953,630 describes an aircraft windshield comprising a flexible insert with high mechanical resistance, composed of a strip of fabric of glass fibers impregnated with rubber, or even polyester fibers or stainless steel wires. This insert extends beyond the periphery of the windshield and its emerging end is made rigid so as to be bolted to the body of the aircraft.
The application FR-A1-2 612 174 relates to an aircraft windshield composed of two polycarbonate sheets with a soft interpolated polyurethane layer sandwiched between them. Because of the low rigidity of the whole thus constituted, it is not possible to contemplate an assembly identical to that of a glass windshield, by mere clamping in the fillister, without risking an ejection of the windshield due to substantial deformations of the polycarbonate. The document nonetheless makes such an assembly possible, by proposing to countersink in the periphery of the interpolated layer a rigid belt, of metal for example, on a level with the edge of the windshield.
A comparable rigid belt, intended for a glass partition for a pressurized aircraft cockpit, comprising two sheets of glass and an interpolated plastic layer, also is disclosed by patent application FR-A1-2 720 029. This belt, also countersunk in the periphery of the interpolated layer, extends beyond the periphery of the glass partition only possibly to cover the edge thereof partially or completely, the belt then having a corresponding L, respectively T profile.